Socket set

Much as I hate suggesting them as a source, Halfrauds Pro seems to be the best blend of quality and price.

If he's just going for one set for general lightish use, I'd start with

A quick look at their website shows a decent looking 18-piece 3/8" all metric starter kit for £20, well inside budget. Unwieldy URL, but product code 926352. As with all these kits, it's maybe not 100% as you'd want (9mm instead of 8mm?), but looks like a bloody good starting point.

There's also a couple of £25ish sets with more bits - but one's 1/4" and largely too small to be useful, the other's from the non-"Pro" range with a truly dreadful looking ratchet and bulked out with the usual useless Dibnah sizes. Not sure I'd bother with either, but might be worth a quick look in store.

My maturing (at last!) son asked about a source of an affordable socket set for the odd bit of car maintenance, etc.

My something like 40 year old 1/2" drive set cost me 99p, because the lassy in the store rang £9.99 up wrong !! - and has lasted me well. Where should I suggest he goes for something uncomplicated - he's prepared to pay ~£30, and with a system that makes errors like the one I should have been honest about !!

Rob

I would agree. Halfords Pro are of good quality. They do have "sales" from time to time.

The kits are 50% off at the mo, so the one above is £20 not £40.

I suspect it's a bit of an Allied Carpets sale, though...

The Hilka set I bought 40-odd years ago is still going strong, despite the ratchet serving the occasional use as a hammer and the extensions as drifts.

Dunno if Hilka stuff is as good as that these days.

I bought a set of ratchet ring spanners a few months ago from them. They seem to be OK.

My maturing (at last!) son asked about a source of an affordable socket set for the odd bit of car maintenance, etc.

My something like 40 year old 1/2" drive set cost me 99p, because the lassy in the store rang £9.99 up wrong !! - and has lasted me well. Where should I suggest he goes for something uncomplicated - he's prepared to pay ~£30, and with a system that makes errors like the one I should have been honest about !!

Hellfrauds Pro.... Lifetime guarantee as well.

Well worth the money and I use them daily on lorry loader cranes and the like. I lost a couple of ¼ drive ones and went in to buy replacements and the girl at the counter said that's Ok... They're lifetime replacement even if you lose them ! If you have anyone that has a Trade Card they often give some good discounts to Trade bods too..... Like me ;-)

I will agree that I have also heard good reports on Halfords, but question your ethics of not pointing out the stores error!

Mike

My ethics? I fear you have the wrong person?

Only really need half inch for cylinder heads, crankshaft bearing caps, and suspension bits. Quarter inch is also often really useful on modern cars.

Often need ring and open end spanners too.

The Pro range are also guaranteed for life - take a damaged piece in and they replace it. Ratchet mechanisms are not covered, but from what I've heard elsewhere, they often exchange them anyway.

The only poor items in my set are the Torx bits. The bits consist of the bit itself, permanently mounted into a square drive base. All sizes neck down to the same size hex where they are attached to the base and I have snapped two T55s while tightening cylinder-head bolts. They were being torqued up with a torque wrench too, so were not being abused such as you might when releasing a stuck fastening.

SteveW

I think he'll struggle to get anything worthwhile for 30 quid. Work out what the current day equivalent is of a tenner 40 years ago!

Have a look at what the likes of Screwfix and Toolstation have to offer. Their stuff is likely to be reasonable quality.

If he's not in a hurry, Lidl and Aldi have some decent sets every now and again. Lidl had a fairly comprehensive set of sockets, spanners, screwdrivers, etc. all in a case for about £70 at the beginning of April. You just *might* find a branch that's still got some.

Halford Pro range for tools you won't have to replace because they're cheap s*it.

Biggles

Their sales on socket sets are usually around bank holidays.

Biggles

I have a nice 48-piece set of those from Screwstation for about 30 quid. Ah, think it was this one:

Theo

I was given a 1/2" drive Elora set for my 21st B'day. I'm 59 now and it is still in perfect condition (better than I am!!). I think Elora has morphed into Draper Expert in a number of cases but the quality still seems to be there from what I read. More and more though I find there is little room around engines to fit

I just snapped a Halfords Pro socket using a normal socket wrench. That definitely wasn't "good quality". IMHO buying cheap is not worth it.

IME they won't without the original receipt.